BY PIP HINMAN
US President George Bush's "alliance of the willing" to attack Iraq is looking pretty thin: the governments of Britain's Tony Blair and John Howard don't make up for Washington's general lack of allies. Now, with Howard's popularity in decline and the polls showing just 6% of the population would support a war without UN backing, even the prime minister's rhetoric seems to be changing. He told the ABC's 7.30 Report on January 23 that he was in favour of the UN security council meeting before any decision was made about a war on Iraq.
Slowly, Howard is shifting in response to the widespread opposition to the war. The leaders of France and Germany have had to; there, public opinion has been strongly against this war for some time. Germany's Chancellor Gerhardt Schroeder won an election on the strength of his anti-war stand. French President Jacques Chirac is also under pressure, and the two can see the advantages of using a deeply unpopular war to bolster their bid to lead the European Union.
But while Howard has yet to concede that public opinion is against him, opposition leader Simon Crean is rushing to catch up with it. Crean told naval forces about to leave Sydney on the HMAS Kanimbla on January 23 that the troop deployment was premature. "I don't want to mince my words, because I don't believe that you should be going", he said.
The Labor Party is rushing to catch up with the broad anti-war sentiment that the Greens and Democrats recognised some time ago. But even these parties have been slow to devote significant resources to developing this sentiment into a political movement that can stop Howard from going to war.
Many unions have passed anti-war motions and some, like the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union, are urging their members to support emergency actions around the war. The Australian Education Union (AEU) and the Victorian Trades and Labor Council are also urging unionists to get involved in the movement.
"The AEU will participate in and work to build the widest coalition of anti-war forces ever seen in Australian society ...", a recent AEU conference resolution states. It goes on: "If the Howard government commits Australia to an unjustified war, the AEU urges the people of Australia not to support or co-operate with the war effort in any way." Victorian Trades Hall Council secretary Leigh Hubbard has urged the union movement to "act in solidarity" with community, church and peace groups in upcoming anti-war protest actions.
The socialist left faction of the NSW ALP has also recently declared its "total and unequivocal opposition to a war on Iraq ... irrespective of whether it is endorsed by the United Nations Security Council or not." It has also called on its members to "assist in and devote significant resources" to the anti-war movement.
This all helps build the pressure on Howard not to join the war. But it's coming late. The anti-war sentiment across Australia by far exceeds the level of anti-war organisation. Compared to the US, Britain and Europe — where peace coalitions regularly hold organising meetings of hundreds of activists, and "non-political" people organise rallies in towns where such things have never before been seen — the movement here is still too small and too thinly organised.
It is also too difficult for new people, and especially young people, to get involved — other than to turn up to a demonstration. Local peace groups and other networks are flourishing, that's true, but this needs to be on a much bigger and more intensive scale.
Bush and Howard can be stopped if the movement is able to attach a big enough political cost to a decision to launch another unjust war. But what political cost can the movement impose?
The power in a sustained mass action campaign is not simply that large numbers of people turn out in rallies and marches showing those who rule that many people disagree with them. Bush and Howard are not democrats who only need to be shown the will of the people. The movement's real power lies in the fact that it can radicalise and empower large numbers of people and turn them into political actors. This is the process that terrifies even the most powerful ruling class in history, because it subverts the passivity that allows them to oppress and exploit.
So we need to build the next round of marches and rallies as big as possible, but we also need to involve as many people as possible in organising these and other anti-war actions.
We haven't a moment to lose. The anti-war movement overseas shows the potential. Here people are asking, begging even, when is the next demonstration, the next public meeting, the next vigil? We have a chance to stop Howard, a chance we cannot squander. The only way we can is to use every available means to activate the alliance of the unwilling — the majority of Australian people.
Across Australia, this means extending existing anti-war coalitions and activist groups and developing new ones, helping new activists — old or young — find their political feet and arguing passionately — at every forum we can — against this unjust war.
John Howard didn't look too comfortable as he waved off the young men and women onboard the HMAS Kanimbla. And he shouldn't be. Howard has ordered them to fight a war that the majority of Australians don't support. He knows that it won't be just the navy and army personnel who'll be put on the line, but his government as well if he doesn't win more support for this war.
As things stand, this looks increasingly unlikely. The 45,000-strong protest in Melbourne last October and the 50,000 who took to the streets across Australia in November were a good start. There's every indication that protests will become even bigger. If more unions devote their considerable resources to the anti-war movement, it will be greatly strengthened.
The February 14-16 rallies across Australia, which will coincide with protests taking place in the UK and the US, could well be the biggest global anti-war demonstations ever. Political leaders — in government and opposition — ignore them at their peril.
[Pip Hinman is a member of the national executive of the Democratic Socialist Party and is active in the Sydney Walk Against the War Coalition.]
From 91×ÔÅÄÂÛ̳ Weekly, January 29, 2003.
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